Bernard Luthi, VP of marketing, Web management and customer service at Newegg, discusses how his company uses DRTV.

Q: How does Newegg use DRTV? What are the company's main goals?

A: Ultimately, the goal is to take advantage of the opportunity to brand ourselves in one of the key traditional broadcast channels: TV advertising. DRTV was our opportunity to extend our budget and make good use of the dollars available and do it in a way that worked with our media plan. It was a solid opportunity to get additional exposure for a significantly reduced rate.

Q: Was the reduced rate the main reason you decided to use DRTV?

A: That was certainly a big factor, but so was the way we could structure the ad itself. We had a very polished advertisement that we made to introduce the name Newegg to an audience. We shot three commercials like that. They were very well-produced commercials and they were meant to say, 'Here's a company called Newegg.' The DRTV spots were shot with a much more grainy, hand-held camera feel and inside someone's home. We went out and found real Newegg customers, and the whole purpose of them was to add on to the regular ads. You can see how we produced the general spot and then followed up with a spot that says, 'Here's a real customer, and here's his first-hand experiences shopping with us.'

Q: Do you run short-form DRTV commercials? Which works best for Newegg?

A: I think 30 seconds allows us to keep the attention of the consumer without pushing the bounds. What we are talking about here are commercials with someone basically saying, 'This is why I shop at Newegg.' We are talking about experimenting with a 60-second spot, but the 30-second spot works pretty well.

Q: Do they have a call-to-action and other traditional DRTV elements? Or is the goal branding or a combination of the two?

A: It's a little bit of a hybrid, but it doesn't have a 'call now' type of call-to-action. The message is more of a 'I went to Newegg — here's what I bought, it's really cool, and I'm happy I went there to buy it.' It's a very soft sell, and it is really reaffirming that we are a brand that is meticulous about giving customers strong information.